For the record...

Some wise men (ahem, The Eagles) once said, "For the record, we never broke up. We just took a 14-year vacation." The same applies to this blog - we never really broke up. We just took a vacation.

(yes, he already rolls his eyes at my hilarious jokes)

On our "vacation," life changed pretty drastically.  Jonas has a new job, and our family moved halfway across the country to Portland - someplace we'd always thought would be an awesome place to live.

He rode in the plane, not the packing cube (much to the disappointment of most

United Flight passengers).

Since hitting the city limits of Portlandia, we've explored, gotten lost (on foot, and in the car), pronounced almost everything wrong (Willamette...rhymes with "well dammit." Who knew?!), spent approximately 20 hours per day outside (rain or shine -- and surprisingly, more 'shine' than we expected), and Foster has a handful of new Oregonian hobbies:

Taking in some of the culture...

...focusing on his art...

...exploring...

...climbing high, running far....

(Jonas is already hoping to help him PR on that mile time)

...turning 100% beach bum...

...deciding cheese is not good...

(?????)

...and nearly perfecting the eye roll.  

He's just gonna shake, shake, shake....

...shake it off, that is.  As much as the boy enjoys a nice Mumford & Sons riff, Foster's developed a weak spot for Taylor Swift and her (unfortunately catchy) "Shake it off." On average, he's taken to watching her music video about 12 times before lunch.

Lucky for me, the song is just long enough to allow me to brush my teeth, put on deodorant, and figure out where the heck I'm supposed to be that day.  

Also lucky : he hates her old songs. Thank you, Foster.

And, speaking of luck, we've been hitting some record high temperatures over the past couple of weeks. (Should I be concerned about global warming? Maybe. Am I going to complain about 74 degrees in January? Not a chance.)

So, excuse us for the short blog post, but we have shoes to take off, shorts to put on, miles to run, and some weather to enjoy before February slaps us across the face.

Also - "Shake it off" just ended, and I need to hit replay.

Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming...

...and, that's exactly what Foster has been doing over the past few months (as it turns out, Dory is a lot smarter than we give her credit for...).  Swimming. Crawling. Walking. RUNNING. While he had a late start in the crawling and walking departments, he's more than made up for it (and added to it) in enthusiasm. We were lucky enough to get his first steps on video:

And, since then, he's taken the entire house (and dog) by storm.  He's added professional pool floating to his list of favorite activities, and is looking forward to next summer's swimming season.

He's also found a new list of favorite things to do that we're not arguing with one little bit. At the top of the list, you can find wiping down the wood floors with baby wipes, polishing windows, and helping his dad sweep out the garage.

While he's not cleaning, floating, and charging around the house, he's keeping a busy morning schedule every day while he shares his time between the two Genesis nurseries. He works hard, so he has to even things out by playing hard...and apparently not following directions, because I'm pretty sure the reason he's smiling is because someone was telling him NOT to stand in his chair...

(Side note : I realize that I was counter-acting the discipline that the wonderful Felicia was trying to instill on him by laughing and taking a picture.)

Other than that, our days have become pretty routine - we do, however, fit in a little time to enjoy the great weather we've been lucky enough to have for so long, have a lot of fun with dad, and to channel our inner Jack Jack at any given time.

Year One: Mission Accomplished (and, the best belated present ever)

As much as I tried to ignore it, Foster went ahead and turned ONE last week and kicked off the ultimate birthday weekend (a party with every branch of the family that he could possibly fit in).

With THREE chances to dive in to the birthday cake, the results were as follows:

Attempt One: "Not a chance."

Attempt Two (with his cousin, Henry -- born 4 days apart): "Nah...you go ahead, Hank."

Attempt Three: "I thought I told you guys already....Leave. Me. Alone."

Instead, he opted to spend a lot of time in Hoot's pool, and spend some quality time with his cousins.

Lots of new responsibilities with the new age bracket:

New role as a risk-taker added to the resume.

What's this in the fine print?! SHOTS?

"I guess as I get older, I should probably take my health a little more seriously..."

The VERY best part of the week included a trip to have his head re-measured, and resulted in some surprise news:

NO MORE HELMET!

This certainly makes this risk-taking stuff a little more stressful....

Summertime!

After a long, long, winter at the Steinbrink house (and more bouts with the stomach flu than this germaphobe cares to talk about. Like seriously -- a record number), warmer weather finally hit, making Foster a VERY happy boy.  He's taking advantage of every opportunity to be outdoors:


Quality time bonding with his dog:
(She's just thrilled.)

Helping his dad put things together the right way:

(Upside down directions are a necessity.)

Becoming a pro at watching for dad to come home from work:

Giving SPF 50 a run for its' money:

(He is not burnt in the below picture, C.P.S., no worries - just a bad flash)

(but check out that helmet tan-line)

The ever-important "spying on the neighbors" task:

And the highly coveted role of "Garden Supervisor:"

We're still waiting on the green light to get this helmet off -- but until then, hopefully these tiny holes that the specialist drilled in the back help him out in the 95 degree trips outside that he keeps insisting on.